Chicago Photowalk with Trey Ratcliff

Yesterday I went to Trey Ratcliff’s Chicago Photowalk. I had fun walking from the Adler Planetarium toward the Bean. As usual on my many photowalks, I tend to stray from the large groups and do my own thing. I just find it difficult to get shots I want around dozens or in this case hundreds of other photographers.

This event was actually my second time that I met Trey. The first time was a few years ago at a Santa Monica Photowalk along with MySpace Tom. That was actually the first time I tried doing some HDR photography, and the results were atrocious. I’ve since learned a bit about HDR and how not to shoot everything everywhere in HDR. It’s a technique that has a time and place, not a permanent setting for all photos. I’m glad that I got to meet, speak, and have my photo taken with Trey. His work and zen philosophy is a big inspiration to me and many others.

Earlier in the day it was raining, and I thought it wouldn’t stop. Thankfully it did, but it did leave a haze across the Chicago skyline. I know we all make due with the weather and situation, but I know my city has a beautiful skyline on crisp clear evenings and night. It was disappointing for out-of-towners to visit and not be treated to the best of Chicago.

By the way, I use Parking Panda and got a pretty sweet deal, $14, for parking near the Chicago Bean. It’s the cheapest price I could find in that area compared with other services if you plan to park longer than 2-3 hours.

My big takeaway from this photowalk, like any photowalk, is being familiar with the areas that I would like to revisit on another day.